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At some point Republicans are going to figure out that it just doesn’t sound very good when they express joy over people not voting. But that day hasn’t arrived yet, per this statement by a Republican legislative leader in Nevada:

This is not the last you wiil hear of this: Assembly Minority Leader Pat Hickey, sitting down with a friendly interviewer (Dan Mason) on conservative talk radio, got careless and talked about how great for the GOP that young people and minorities won’t turn out in presidential year numbers in 2014.

The Democrats had an energize-the-base missive out about it shortly after he said it, saying in part: “Yes, you heard that right — the Republican Party is so out-of-touch with Nevada families they are finally admitting the only way they can win an election is for as few people to vote as possible.”

How hard is it to talk about “favorable turnout patterns” or something? I guess it’s pretty hard if you are fundamentally wired to think an awful lot of voters—say, 47% of them—aren’t objective enough to vote in the first place.

Ed Kilgore
is a contributing writer to the Washington Monthly. He is managing editor for The Democratic Strategist and a senior fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute. Find him on Twitter: @ed_kilgore.

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